Listing
Call listing broker John Hill at 325.721.4428 for more information.
Overview
- 1468 square feet
- 4 bedrooms
- 2 full baths, 1 half bath
- All systems new - this includes
- sewer line and water line from meter to house
- interior plumbing
- HVAC system
- wiring and light fixtures
- roof
- foundation repair
- drywall and paint
- flooring
Before & After
Exterior
Kitchen
Living Room
Hall Bath, Interior Hall, & NW Bedroom
SE Bedroom
NE Bedroom
Primary Bedroom
Backstory
When 1226 Meander was purchased by the current owner, the property was condemned by the City of Abilene. To make this home habitable, the owner had to meet all the steps for renovation as if this was a newly built home. Each step of improvement - structural changes, plumbing, electrical work, insulation - were followed by a city inspection that culminated in a final inspection to release the home of condemned status.
The property was in rough shape when acquired. Lots of discarded household goods were still inside the home. There were three gaping holes in the roof, in other places there were four layers of shingles. The backyard was an an impenetrable thicket of scrub and trees. The holes in the ceiling resulted in damage to the floors - in one place it had simply rotted into a large hole in the floor.
Multiple dumpster loads later, the house was finally clean. Thank you to Derriel Smith, Nathaniel Finch, Bode Walters, and Bryce Hernandez for not running when they saw the work we had to do to empty this house. We found a dead possum and had to evacuate a swarm of bees, but we never found the fabled gold ring - I came to understand this was narrative all the meth addicts had given the house to provide a pretext to ransack the place. I really had no clear perspective on the house until this was done - it was impossible to walk the house initially due to the holes in the floor and household goods that had been ransacked by treasure hunters.
Originally, this 1468 sf home had three bedrooms and one bath. The living room had a decorative gas fireplace flanked by windows. The floor plan had a dining room plus a separate breakfast area off the kitchen with an arched-entry breakfast nook.
To modernize the floorplan and make the home live larger and more comfortably, two baths were reconfigured plus a half bath and an additional bedroom. Half of the kitchen, the breakfast room, and utility room became part of a newly reconfigured bedroom - the other part of the kitchen became a closet for the bedroom and a hall bath. The gas fireplace was demo-ed and the windows flanking the fireplace were enclosed in favor of a new window that would be centered over the sink in a kitchen that was part of the redesigned living / dining area across the front of the house.
This house never really had a patio on the rear of the house, just a rear stoop. By putting the kitchen at the front, it allows the new homeowner to enjoy their porch right off the kitchen and living room. The 2-car carport that replaced the old garage doubles as flex space for a vehicles or an outdoor pavilion for backyard gatherings.
If you wonder what an $8000 tree trimming bill looks like, this is it. The back yard was filled with dead trees and scrub. Four large hackberries had grown up between the stone fence and the house. Thorton's Tree Service worked for two days to clear all the trees and scrub from the yard so we could turn to the roof next.
Once we could actually get to the roof, the old roof was demo-ed and new framing, decking, underlayment, and a new composition shingle roof was added. This was much more intense than any roof job previous flips have called for - the three holes in the roof demanded a complete rebuild of the roof framing. You'd think with four layers of shingles (in some places) we might have enjoyed more protection! Thank you to Felipe and Jose Cano and team for bringing the roof back to life.
Floor joists were rebuilt and work was done to get the house level (but if you stand in the center hall you can still feel evidence of a central concrete beam that runs through the middle of the house - at 97 years of age, I plead old house on this one). Surprisingly, even with the neglect to the home, the perimeter beam was in good shape - just needed some crack patches here and there. Thank you to Travis Flatager for overseeing this part of the job.
Next all the interior finishes - wallpaper, paneling, cabinets, etc. were stripped out so we could begin framing the interior. The shiplap is still there, it's now under a moisture barrier and drywall.
Before we go to far, it's worth memorializing those that gave their life for 1226 Meander. The old garage was built on dirt, sagging to one side, had holes in the ceiling - I felt if we removed the garage door to give it more clearance, the whole thing would collapse. At the outset of the renovation, the garage provided a good place to store building supplies, then we cannibalized as much good siding as we could from the structure, and then Angel Orozco added the back stoop, leveled the backyard and popped roots, patched the rock wall, and then pushed the garage down, and built the new carport. Matt Ramon added the paint to make it match the house. RIP staunch garage...
Back to the interior. Once a floor plan was decided (I have seven iterations leading up to the final plan), framing begin. Thank you to Ramiro Padilla for his good work on this part of the job. All the windows have been replaced, courtesy of Oscar Gonzales who oversaw the bulk of the work going forward. Tommy Rangel and his team executed the paint work on caulking, repainting and resurrection of the exterior siding which was in suprisingly good shape - almost all the patches on the exterior are the result of enclosing windows, not rot.
After plumbing, electric, HVAC, and framing inspections we could finally begin pulling this house back together, courtesy of Oscar Gonzales and his team.
To get the most from the space and the 9' ceilings, custom cabinets were designed and installed by Ricky Nygaard in the two full baths and kitchen. Ricky also did the crown mouldingin the kitchen, living, and entry. Interior paint was overseen by Oscar Gonzales. Oscar also installed doors and did the lion's share of the base trim work throughout the house.
At this point, the story comes to a close with the listing photos. Michael Steele provided the quartz counters for the kitchen, bathrooms, and wet area window sills. Clint Pelzel installed the luxury vinyl plank throughtout the house. Daniel Avila built the master shower and installed the subway tile in the baths and kitchen. Louis Santana installed the wallpaper in the half bath. As always, Burleson Electric did the complete rewire and installation of new fixtures on the house and Loya Plumbing replaced the sewer line, added a new water line from the house to the meter, and replumbed the entire house. Lastly the team of Barnett & Hill - Erin Steddum, Wayne Corley, David Wilson, Lee Garza, and Eddie Gonzales contributed throughout the project to clean up details and make thing happen to get things to the finish line.
Trades
- Daniel Avila | 325.669.3301 - ceramic tile, shower build, fine details on flooring
- Barnett & Hill | 325.677.3500 - all the other weird jobs
- Burleson Electric | 325.480.1717 - rough-in of electrical, installation of final electric
- Felipe Cano | 325.267.1263 - rebuilt framing for new roof, redecking, roof installation
- Travis Flatager | 325.518.6852 - foundation and leveling
- Oscar Gonzales | 325.660.0266 - oversaw drywall installation & finishing, interior paint, door installation, window installation, detail interior carpentry, exterior detail work (the GC along with me)
- Loya Plumbing | 325.266.4887- new sewer line, new water line, all interior plumbing, installing of new plumbing fixtures.
- Michael Mireles | 325.266.5569 - routine yard maintenance
- Ricky Nygaard | 325.370.1200 - cabinets, crown moulding
- Angel Orozco | 325.660.5149 - concrete work, masonry, garage demo, earthwork to level back yard, carport.
- Ramiro Padilla | 325.260.3769 - framing
- Clint Pelzel | 325.234.0072 - installation of luxury vinyl plank flooring
- Tommy Rangle 325.338.7088 - exterior caulking & paint.
- Matt Ramon, 325-333-2285, carport paint
- Louis Santana | 325.660.4706 - wallpaper
- Derriel Smith | 325.386.3643 - trash out and haul off
- Michael Steel | 325.280.2815 - countertops
- Thorton's Tree Service | 325.770.0410- tree removal and brush clearing
Paints Used
